Last week I purchased a burger at Burger King for $1.58. The counter girl took my $2 and I dug in my pocket for 8 cents and gave it to her. She stood there, holding the nickel and 3 pennies, while looking at the screen on her register. I sensed her discomfort and tried to tell her to just give me two quarters, but she hailed the manager for help. While he tried to explain the transaction to her as she stood there and cried.

Hence the evolution of teaching math:

1. Teaching Math In 1960

A logger sells a truckload of lumber for $100. His cost of production is 4/5 of the price. What is his profit ?

2. Teaching Math In 1970

A logger sells a truckload of lumber for $100. His cost of production is 4/5 of the price, or $80. What is his profit?

3. Teaching Math In 1980

A logger sells a truckload of lumber for $100. His cost of production is $80. Did he make a profit?

4. Teaching Math In 1990

A logger sells a truckload of lumber for $100. His cost of production is $80 and his profit is $20. Your assignment: Underline the number 20.

5. Teaching Math In 2000

A logger cuts down a beautiful forest because he is white, selfish, and inconsiderate. He cares nothing for the habitat of animals or the preservation of woodlands. He does this so he can make a profit of
$20 to spend at Wal-Mart. What do you think of this way of making a living? Topic for class participation after answering the question: How do birds and squirrels feel as the logger cuts down their homes?

6. Teaching Math In 2010

Un hachero vende una carretada de maderapara $100. El costo de la producciones es $80. Cuanto dinero ha hecho?

You know… if you’re gonna’ be stupid, you gotta’ be smart about it.

I love one-liners, and the poetry of this one rang true in my ears as soon as it left my lips. I quickly Googled to see if anyone had ever officially said it yet (like Yogi Berra), and to my delight they had not. So I get to have my very own one-liner… my very own Yogiism. Well done me.

The event that stimulated this burst of reason was this – I was told of a group on the website Facebook (a social networking site similar to MySpace) that was entitled “Henry Mills sucks penis” [the name has been changed]. This group was started and joined by current and former members of a local Christian school… and the object of their wrath, Mr. Mills, is a well-respected official of that same school and church. The group’s Facebook page includes disrespectful and insanely inappropriate and infantile content that I won’t share here.

Now… how nervy do you have to be to create and/or join such a group actually using your primary Facebook account with your name and picture displayed for any school official or parent to identify… and to do this while having not yet graduated from the school?! While you’re at it why don’t you just set your diploma on fire right now?! And needless to say, once the school found out about this Facebook group just a few days ago, it was quickly put out of its misery.

So upon hearing this story I exclaimed, “You know… if you’re gonna’ be stupid, you gotta’ be smart about it!” There is harmony in this statement – it’s found in the mix of bumbling wisdom and denotative paradox. But as I pondered, I discerned some “deeper” force at work here. So I put my thoughts down in the form of a socio-algebraic law:

Mooradian’s Law of Multiplicative Idiocy

As the probability of an individual or entity to engage in an idiotic action increases, the faulty cognitive processes driving this increase also propend the same individual or entity to engage in further related idiotic actions, such that the original idiocy is amplified through a mechanism of synergistic multiplication. This described propensity incites a daisy-chain of idiotic action occurring independent of (and possibly in addition to) the coincidental succession of an individual’s or entity’s natural random idiocy as expressed by a Poisson distribution.

As a previous leader of soldiers, I truly saw this law in action. Anyone who’s been in the military knows soldiers and sailors sometimes have an affinity for mayhem. And certain sailors and soldiers have perfected foolishness down to a black art. Now, it amazed me how my soldiers would sometimes commit egregious acts of idiocy, and follow it up by recording their actions in photographic or audio-visual form – thereby supplying incrimination leading to their own demise!? That’s the law of multiplicative idiocy.

Recently, on a local blog, I was conversing with an argumentative and illogical fellow. No sooner had I soundly discounted all his faulty lines of reasoning, when a mysterious second fellow appeared on the blog and echoed the first fellow’s identical illogic. Little did “either” of them know that I’m an admin for the blog… and I could see that “both” fellows were posting from the same IP address! Upon greater inspection, a third and fourth troublesome fellow on the blog were also from this same IP address! When pressed for the truth, the original fellow claimed that the other “three” fellows were indeed real people (housemates) whom he shared his home computer with. Of course, he couldn’t then explain why when I tracerouted his IP address it routed back to a single-point external gateway for a local health insurance company (as verified by their IT security staff). That’s the law of multiplicative idiocy.

How about the lady who tried to pay for her Wal-Mart merchandise with a counterfeit bill? She used a bill of such a high denomination ($1 Million) that not only did the store have no choice but to examine the bill with such scrutiny as would certainly discover the fake… but the store wouldn’t have had nearly enough cash to even make change, anyway! That’s the law of multiplicative idiocy.

The robber who empties the convenience store cash register, but then pays for a soda with his credit card before leaving. The student who vandalizes school property, then brags about it to a teacher. The man who shows up to DUI court drunk. That’s the law of multiplicative idiocy.

So I walk into my mall through Best Buy, as I always do… but I don’t buy anything at Best Buy this time. Why not? Because Best Buy lost its testicles. As a proud owner of a pair of testicles… and as my infatuation with Best Buy was directly proportional to its placation of my testosterone driven electronic interests… I shall not shop their during the “holidays”. This is decidedly inconvenient as my friends and relatives always had an automatic gift for me in the coveted Best Buy Gift Card. So if you’re listening (reading)… this year make it a Wal-Mart card, as they seem to be not having as much trouble accepting the December 25th hubbub.

So I walk out of Best Buy and am immediately accosted by young slutty girls holding big empty containers asking me if I “want to support cheerleading”. What? Do I want to support the CONCEPT of cheerleading? Do I want to support more coverage for NFL teams’ cheerleaders? I knew what she was asking… she wanted my money. But for what? Uniforms? Pom-poms? Shouldn’t she buy her own? I mean really… what possible cheerleading costs are there? And why should I pony up Hamiltons to this little tart wearing a slut shirt from Abercrombie & Fitch ($55), a slimline cellphone ($180), and slut skirt from Rue 21 ($48) asking ME for money just so her father standing behind her wearing the Tagheur watch ($330), gay Express Men pants ($45), and holding his new putter ($68) doesn’t have to pony up himself?

So I walk into the Apple store. Now, I am admittedly a PC guy… partly because my brain and motor coordination can handle more than one mouse button. Actually, I even PREFER more than one mouse button and find myself using the so-called “mousewheel” very frequently. I’m walking into the Apple store to pickup a little hard case for my new fancy red 8GB iPod nano. It’s my first iPod and I’m diggin’ it. My choice of red was because I greatly preferred it over black (the other choice), and not because it’s part of the product red movement which is a somewhat leftist dick-dance of an effort to fight AIDS in Africa by donating $10 of your red iPod purchase in the name of Oprah and Bono. This inexplicably satiates the little activist hearts of the young Starbucks demographic and relieves them of the drudgery of actually doing something to help Africans.

Going to the mall is like going to the zoo… and I like watching animals so both are a good fit, but the mall does’t help my cynicism.

It’s a dangerous business, Frodo, going out of your door. You step into the road, and if you don’t keep your feet, there is no knowing where you might be swept off to.
- Bilbo Baggins

Wal-Mart turns away helper dog
Mother says rights of her daughter were violated; retailer says store’s employees to receive training

Wednesday, October 4, 2006 Page: B1

ALBANY – Some parents choose to stay quiet about their child’s mental illness, but not Michell Schilling. She has worked hard to make sure her son, who suffers from schizoaffective disorder, and her daughter, who suffers from bipolar disorder, don’t feel stigmatized. She’s not afraid to talk about their conditions and spends time doing research to make sure they know about the best therapies. Now the Esperance woman is alleging that a manager at the Crossgates Commons Wal-Mart infringed on her daughter’s rights over the weekend by refusing them access to shop in the store with her child’s young psychiatric service dog.

[...]

Sounds pretty clear that this dog should have been let in, right? Well… as I read the story I learned that this “young psychiatric service dog” is just a little puppy that she carries around solely for her bipolar disorder. That’s right, the creature is her living cheer-up toy. This dog hasn’t been trained to do anything except be a puppy… but by virtue of being a cute, furry animal it serves as her “helper”. So this otherwise normal looking little Mrs. Hyde tries to waltz into Wal-Mart with her poor furry prisoner and (of course) gets stopped. So then the mother gets all upset at mean ‘ole Wal-Mart infringing on her hellion’s rights to have her therapeutic canine with her at all times.

Now, without being insensitive or misunderstanding the “disorder”, can I ask a question? Why the heck did they give some crazy bipolar chick a puppy?! Are they crazy? [pardon the pun] Somebody call Canine Protective Services! This reminds me of Darla in Finding Nemo (a psycho girl who is given fish and promptly shakes them to death). How many tantrums has this little dog endured? I wonder how far she can throw him… hmmm…? *ponders*

And to top off the lunacy of this whole thing… the employees are going to get training now. Sensitivity training. I am so sick of hearing about sensitivity. We are politically correct pansies that have been wussified by the leftist tolerance movement (which is ironically one of the least tolerant movements in existence). If anything… we are WAY TOO sensitive. We should be putting people through “insensitivity training”, so that we can arrest the über-tolerance that is decaying their brains. We can imbue insensitivity through a strict regimen of offensive behavior. The training would probably look like the boot camp scene at the beginning of Full Metal Jacket, except with more shooting and swearing. They’d have to complete special missions, too… like slipping pork products into potluck dishes at mosques… and setting up public nativity scenes made of veal cutlets.

Before I go, here’s another question. From the story above we see this same mother has a son with “schizoaffective disorder”. Would it infringe on his rights if Wal-Mart refused to let him buy five of an item marked “Limit 1 per customer”?